Pancakes
by piratesmiley
Summary: Olivia is determined to bring Peter back. Post Northwest Passage. AU. P/O.


_A/N: Post Northwest Passage - if this were a perfect world..._

_Disclaimer: I don't own Fringe._

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In Olivia Dunham's official report on the retrieval of Peter Bishop, she maintains that after cornering him on the sidewalk outside a rundown drugstore in Washington state, he agreed to talk. Just talk.

So she talked.

He talked.

They talked sense.

And so he came back.

But that's not what happened.

* * *

Leads, leads. They don't pan out. Peter Bishop continues to be number one. _My number one, my number one._ No, not really. But perhaps. Contradictions, contradictions.

Lack of sleep makes her fuzzy in a multitude of ways. Her brain is spinning webs. Cobwebs – lack of thought; spider webs – lack of light. Also, she didn't have time to shave her legs this morning. So she ends up with fuzzy.

A flight to Washington. Why Washington? She doesn't know. It doesn't matter. She'll try anything at this point. Anything, because Walter is flying. Walter is not _like_ a kite; he _is_ one. Plus she misses Peter. But not really. Contradictions, contradictions.

She finds him by chance, incidentally. Second day out and she was ready to fly back tomorrow. Broyles spilled the beans about Peter's secret call, but again, nothing. Almost a month of nothing.

She felt like something was waiting to settle in her chest, like she was a little hollow – just a little – but she couldn't rest until something filled the space.

She walks into the drugstore for a change of scenery; he almost walks out to be rid of it. He catches her by the arm before she can take up residence in the candy aisle.

"What are you doing here?"

She blinks, then: "Looking for you."

Like it's obvious. But it is; he should not be surprised.

(Somehow he is anyway.)

"You shouldn't have come."

"Why? It's a free country. I can follow you around if I want to. If I have to."

_Are you going to make me?_

"I'm not going back, Olivia."

"Fine," she said, and pulled him out the door. For an instant he thinks she's arresting him.

"Where are we going?"

"Dinner. I'm hungry."

* * *

Pancakes, pancakes. They find a diner – she'd always thought she'd like him in one. Turns out she was right, she does. They don't talk, mostly. They just size each other up.

He looked very good to her in the sense that he was sitting across from her. He looks awful in every other sense. Thinner, ringed eyes, the air of sadness. Like a madman, he didn't say much. Like a madman, he was severely damaged. She missed his wholeness. But she was glad to have any fraction at this point.

He had missed her, too. But he refused to divulge anymore. She betrayed him, right along with the others; he had not forgotten.

But this wasn't the time to hold it against her.

"So," she started.

"So," he responded.

"So I'm sorry."

_Well, that was quick._

He notices her pancakes cut to shreds, the product of stress and worry. She leans back in the booth and just looks, waits.

He sighs, matching her stance. "I'm not coming back."

"I'm not saying it to make you come back."

"Then what are you doing here – trying to clear your conscience?"

And truthfully, she didn't have any answer to that. She was devoting federal time and money to finding him and returning him to a place he had no right to be. But there was no truthful reason. Not one she was willing to say out loud and actualize. Because that would be a step.

She felt ridiculous.

"No, that's not what I'm doing here."

He just waited for an ulterior motive.

"We're falling apart without you."

But he doesn't accept that cop out. If she still has to hide behind _we_ then she has no right to be here.

She knows that. But she is _just barely_ controlling the words coming out of her mouth. She's far too nervous to hold a conversation with him.

There are other things…things she could do with him while being nervous. There are things she wants. But she won't focus on that now.

(Even though it would be much easier and far more pleasurable than this.)

"Walter's not doing well. He's scared."

He looks away; still not acceptable. (It's not that he isn't concerned for Walter, because he was – very deeply so. But that didn't excuse the lies – and besides that, Walter wasn't right in front of him like _she_ was.)

_She came here._ She has to say it, or give birth to missed opportunity.

"And? What else?" he prompts.

Thus starts her stare down. Part with him, part with herself. Her focus slips. _Damn._ She feels her mood shift from a strange cross between pleading and relieved to something else entirely.

"Let's get out of here," she murmurs.

They do.

Or at least, they attempt to. The second they're out the door she has him pinned between someone else's car and her own sweet lips.

Pancakes. Desperation. Old coffee. Finally she does something for the good of herself, for her sanity. And probably for his own good too. She is frantically trying to pour her soul, warm and sticky like caramel, right into his brain. _Know me,_ she begs.

His hands slide from her hips to around her waist to squeeze her closer. He wants their atoms, their little cells, to meet in every way and become the best of friends, because he sure as hell isn't letting go of her now.

_I want to know you_, she prays. _I want you to know me._

_I want you._

She lets go, and they both are surprised by the action, as if they had forgotten there are other things to do besides kiss.

He smiles.

"What?"

"If I didn't know you better, I'd think you were doing this to get me to come back."

She smiles, and it's like the sun smiling on the earth.

"Well, it's a good thing you know me better then."


End file.
